The ability of a person to access digital content can depend, in part, on whether the person has the appropriate software program that recognizes the format of the digital content and a device that can execute the program so that the digital content can be viewed. With the proliferation of devices using different platforms, it can be a challenge to share and access content of one format with a device running a program capable of only accessing and displaying a different format.
For example, a document may be created in a DOCX format (signifying the Office Open Extensible Markup Language (OOXML) format) for a recent version of the MICROSOFT WORD document and word processing software available from Microsoft Corp., but the author would like to view the document on a reader such as the BARNES & NOBLE NOOK brand e-reader tablet available from Barnes & Noble, Inc., which may use an electronic publication (ePub) file format, or the AMAZON KINDLE available from Amazon.com, Inc., which may use a proprietary AZW and KF8 format. In order to view the document on the reader, the document is converted to the appropriate format by an active step, for example, by creating a copy in the appropriate format.
In order to enable content to be consumed across many device platforms, the author or distributor of the content creates copies in each format or the readers contain converters to read and display that particular format. This creates an environment where consumption of content is constrained by format and file type.